Exchanges
by Sherlock Emrys
Summary: A pair of oneshots featuring Tony at Torchwood, and Jack at SHIELD. Chapter 1: Tony @ Torchwood. Chapter Two: Captain Jack Harkness, Agent of SHIELD. (This is a worrying sentence.) No warnings. No pairings. PG despite the presence of Jack and Tony.
1. Tony at Torchwood

**AN: Well, rather than update any of my published fics like a sensible person...**

**Anyway, I started writing this in a notebook about a month ago and have now typed it up and edited it. I have vague plans for a continuation, but I'm not planning on actually writing anything right now.**

**This is a standalone sort of one shot thing, but it's also one of a pair (the other one features Jack as an Avenger). I will post the second one... some time... as a second chapter to this fic, to keep things simple. **

**No warnings, rated PG just because Tony.**

* * *

**Tony Torchwood**

The sound of the Hub door spinning open – quite unnecessarily loudly, all the bells and whistles and blaring klaxons, he was disabling that first thing, ow – broke into the muddled pool of alcohol that was Tony Stark's brain. He groaned and pushed himself upright, grabbing for the repulse gauntlet that he'd been working on before he passed out, just in case. It might be an alien invasion. It _was_ Monday, after all. Probably.

Blinking blearily across the Hub from the workstation he was slouched at, Tony's hungover brain decided that whilst Ianto might be an alien – it would explain the always impeccable suit, and the coffee, and the fact that he was conscious and functioning at this time in the – Tony checked his watch – OK, fine, sort of afternoon – well, he didn't constitute an invasion. And hey, coffee. This was the kind of invasion they should get more often, instead of the ones with slime and nukes.

'Coffee, sir,' Ianto said smoothly, depositing a mug on Tony's desk and adroitly retrieving the three previous ones that had begun to generate civilisations amongst the scattered debris of drunk-science-Tony-engineering. The Torchwood agent skilfully ignored the cannibalised alien tech that Tony did _not _have clearance to access, the strong smell of alcohol and – oh, please, let that _not _be a working lightsabre on the workbench.

Tony gave an incoherent mumble which might have been an obscenity or possibly a declaration of love (or both; this was Tony) and began inhaling caffeine. Ianto left the lab space with his nascent germ civilisations, bent on committing genocide with a dishwasher, and nodded to Gwen as she came in through the iris door. In the lab he'd just left, Tony could be heard swearing a blue streak and vowing to reprogram the door to be hangover-friendly. Gwen spotted the mug of coffee on her desk and gave Ianto a grateful smile.

'How did the hunt go?' Ianto asked her, noting the splatters of mud she was trailing with disapproval.

Gwen made a face. 'The damn thing got into a theatre somehow. I was busy trying to get it down from the ceiling and – you know those tentacles? Well, it –'

Across the Hub, in the Medbay, a grim and unearthly groan echoed. Gwen grabbed at her gun on instinct, Ianto deposited the mugs on the nearest surface and grabbed for a firearm, and a minor explosion in the lab, together with a sudden drop in brightness, indicated that Tony had grabbed at his repulse gauntlet and fired at a light by accident. Hungover Tony invariably meant property damage, although in fairness, so did drunk Tony. And sober Tony.

The ghastly, alien groan echoed again, and this time Gwen made out the words "coffee", "my head", and "damn you, Tony Stark, go fly a nuke into space you overgrown action figure" in the distorted susurration.

A hand appeared on the autopsy table, then another, and Owen Harper hauled himself into view, blinking owlishly and cursing a blue streak so wide that it could be seen from space.

The lift clattered into life and began to descend, as everyone relaxed and replaced their weapons. Ianto retrieved the mugs and headed towards the dishwasher again, as Toshiko stepped from the paving stone, which began the return journey.

'Afternoon,' Tosh greeted Gwen and Ianto, who smiled, and Owen, who swore and slunk off towards the cool, dark morgue to nurse his hangover. 'I erased all the footage of the tentacle thing and the University –' She paused, and sniffed the air suspiciously. 'What did Tony blow up this time?'

'The lights,' Ianto said casually. 'Don't worry, nothing's on fire. Much. Dummy is still programmed with the fire safety protocols.' The distant sounds of Tony threatening the bot with being sent to the ESA's space programme told the rest of the story.

Toshiko glanced over. 'Is that a working lightsabre?'

'Oh, I really hope not,' answered Gwen, as Ianto replied, 'I believe so.'

Tosh blinked. 'He was drunk. How on earth did he –'

'I believe that Mr Stark broke into the Weapons Vault in the Archives whilst we were otherwise occupied,' Jarvis' smooth voice echoed through the hub. 'At the time, Agent Jones was occupied preventing Dr Harper from vomiting on the computers, Agent Cooper was extinguishing the fire caused by Mr Stark's failed rocket launch, and Agent Sato was erasing the security footage of Iron Man dancing in Dewi Sant Shopping Centre with a Weevil to "Gangnam Style". I myself was unable to prevent him as he had programmed an override code into my mainframe.'

'Tosh,' Ianto said calmly.

'On it.' The technician immediately leaped for a computer and began to scroll through Jarvis' coding.

There was a pause.

'Why is he our boss?' Gwen queried.

'I ask myself that daily,' Ianto replied as he emptied the old coffee cups, watching carefully lest the mould prove sentient.

Tosh had booted up her workstation and was pulling up other windows as she continued to work on Jarvis' coding, consulting with the AI occasionally. 'Looks like we've dealt with the Rift activity for today,' she informed Gwen.

'Just as well,' Ianto contributed from the sink. 'I doubt Tony could fly straight today.'

'You should start hiding the alcohol,' Gwen suggested.

Tosh shook her head. 'He just goes to bars with Owen, gets drunk, hits on women and then comes back here to break the laws of physics.'

Meanwhile, in his lab space – a sizable room with glass walls on three sides and brick at the back, several workbenches, computers, bits of technology, and totally sealable in under three seconds – Tony was booting up the holographic screens that he'd installed as soon as he'd arrived, scorning the regular monitors used by the rest of Torchwood. He pulled up some prototypes and began to pull them apart in the air, the familiar patterns of the Rift monitor scrolling through the air to his left. The helper bots were rolling around the lab trying to repair the broken light from the stray repulsor blast, and it was back to business as usual. Tony did his best to ignore the hangover. He had practice and Ianto's coffee on his side, but still spared time to deliver a sullen glare at Owen, who had reappeared from wherever he'd slunk off to with a decided spring in his step.

'Oi, fairy lights!' Owen yelled.

Tony winced. 'Keep it down, you quack,' he grumbled as his headache spiked.

Owen strode into the lab, looking smug and clutching a phial of something. It was an unnatural shade of green. Tony eyed it with distrust.

'That had better not be more of that Vegan Mudworm toxin,' he said warily. 'The stuff that was meant to make everyone speak French and instead made everyone swell up like puffer fish. And by everyone, I mean me. Why did you have to test it on me anyway?'

Owen grinned. 'Cause it was funny. Anyway, this isn't mudworm toxin. You remember last week we were working on the hangover cure serum?'

Tony looked up from his coffee and raised an eyebrow. 'You finished the synthesis?'

'Yup,' Owen said proudly. 'It works perfectly.'

Tony grabbed the phial, flicked the bung out of the top with his thumb, and downed the liquid.

Gwen, outside the lab, looked up in alarm. 'Ianto,' she said slowly, 'Tony just drank something Owen gave him. Be worried?'

Ianto looked over. 'Jarvis, initiate protocol Kappa, authorisation Jones, I.'

'Protocol initialising,' Jarvis said coolly.

The lab door beeped and slammed shut, bolts sliding across, as the lab sealed itself with a hiss. Owen and Tony looked around in surprise and alarm and began to bang at the door, cursing loudly.

'I believe that Mr Stark has just consumed the hangover serum that he and Dr Harper were synthesising last week,' Jarvis announced over the swearing.

'Jarvis, analyse that substance, please,' Tosh put in.

'I will do my best, Agent Sato. However, the remote sensors in Sir's lab were compromised by the blast. It may take several hours to fully decode the molecular structure and run simulations to gauge the effects upon a human.'

'Just do your best, Jarvis. We don't want a repeat of the bubble incident,' Ianto said calmly. All three agents shuddered.

'I shall endeavour to complete the analysis as soon as practicable. I shall, of course, monitor Dr Harper and Mr Stark to alert you if any ill-effects become apparent.'

The swearing redoubled in intensity. Tosh toggled the intercom to mute.

'You know,' Gwen said thoughtfully after a moment's silence, 'I can't think why we don't use this protocol more often.'


	2. Captain Jack Harkness, Agent of SHIELD

**A/N: As of right now there are no actual plans to continue this, although I rather like this universe. I have vaguely sketch-planned a rewritten Battle of New York but not to the extent of writing it, so this will be marked as complete although rewriting the entire Avengers movie is a tantalising thought (read: I am almost stupid enough to do that).**

**Anyone else think that the title of this one shot is quite worrying?**

* * *

**Captain Jack Harkness, Agent of SHIELD **

Steve had seen him at the SHIELD base a few times. He'd caught the super-soldier's eye, because that old uniform was at once completely familiar and jarringly out of place in the modern base. It was the 1944 US Air force uniform – a captain, as it happened – and Steve had wondered briefly if maybe he wasn't the only one who'd wound up out of his time. Maybe someone else had crashed their plane into the ice, and well – no, they would have told him. Perhaps the guy was a re-enactor, or maybe some divisions still wore the old uniforms. Or maybe he was just a bit eccentric. SHIELD attracted the eccentric ones.

His face was familiar too, vaguely, although Steve had never been able to put a name to it. He hadn't thought too hard about it, though, having had several other things on his mind.

Then, one day, Fury had called him into a briefing and started to talk about something called the Avengers Initiative and introduced him to Captain Jack Harkness. Steve rose politely to shake his hand, and the man gave him a ridiculously cheesy, propaganda-poster grin, and said 'A pleasure to meet you, Captain,' in a voice that sounded like it meant something else entirely, and Steve realised where he'd seen him before.

It had been back in the War, and he had been dragged along to some stupid dance because someone somewhere had decided that Captain America needed to get out more (and they didn't really care what Steve Rogers thought). Seventy years ago, but for him it was only a few months. And Captain Harkness had been there, smiling and dancing with all the girls and, well, some of the guys too, and naturally Steve noticed him – it was hard not to.

'You too,' Steve said automatically, and then, 'Actually, we've met. Seventy years ago, at a dance in Denver. You probably noticed me. I was the one dressed as the American flag.'

Captain Harkness met his gaze with a frank and friendly openness that told Steve instantly that he was lying, and said, 'Of course. Captain America's hard to miss. Denver, huh?'

'Some event to raise troop morale,' Steve said evenly. 'You're looking good for a man who fought in the War.'

Captain Harkness grinned. 'You can talk. We should form a club.'

Steve smiled tightly and Harkness sat down casually. 'Heard about your plane,' he said with an easy smile. 'Stuck in the ice, that sucks. Slow, too. I once spent a thousand years in a volcano, but at least it was warm. Ice, not my idea of fun.'

Steve sat too, suspicion, scepticism and disbelief crowding into his mind. 'Captain Harkness, do you expect me to believe that you're over a thousand years old?'

Harkness grinned. 'Captain Rogers, do you expect me to believe that you're a superhero who fought in World War Two?'

Steve conceded the point with a nod and turned to Fury, looking for clarification.

'Captain Harkness has worked for us for twelve years. We have held a file on him for over 100. He was around at this agency's inception,' Fury said coolly. 'He does not have the mutant gene. He has not been exposed to gamma radiation. He is genetically nearly human, although the unidentified patterns of DNA have no significant impact at a cellular level. Physically, he is an ordinary man.'

_But if he's on SHIELD's radar, he's no such thing_, hung unspoken in the air. Fury looked as bland and neutral as ever. Harkness was grinning, although it looked a little forced. Clearly, some of the testing hadn't been voluntary.

'Jack Harkness cannot die.' The words fell into a pregnant silence. 'He ages, at a billionth of the rate of an average human. But he cannot die.'

'How?' Steve asked blankly. He couldn't bring himself to be surprised at anything since he'd woken up in the future.

Jack's eyes were hard. 'There was a girl, a rip in the fabric of time and space… You know how it is.'

Steve did not enquire further, sensing that it was a sensitive topic.

'And he has been recruited to this… initiative?' the soldier asked Fury.

'That's right. Immortality is a useful talent around here.' Fury looked from one to the other. 'I guess you have a lot to talk about, but I need you in Germany. Coulson will brief you. You're taking the jet.'

'Who's piloting?' Harkness asked.

'Black Widow.'

Captain Harkness winced. 'That… isn't Agent Romanoff, is it?'

'You know her?' Fury asked.

'Let's just say… she isn't too fond of me.'

'Captain Harkness, Agent Romanoff isn't too fond of anyone. She's an assassin.'

'Yes, but… she _really_ doesn't like me.

That might have been an understatement, Steve considered, as he watched Black Widow pinning Harkness to the floor of the jet with a gun in his face before Coulson was done introducing them.

Within moments, everyone on the plane except Harkness was holding a weapon. Harkness didn't seem too worried – almost bored.

'Agent Romanoff,' Coulson said steadily, gun pointed in the direction of the combatants, ready to fire at whoever posed the biggest threat. 'Explain.'

'This… man… interfered with a SHIELD sanctioned mission, let a target escape, and sabotaged an operation,' Romanoff gritted out. 'The only reason I haven't put a bullet in his skull is that it didn't seem to take last time. _Sir_.'

'Captain Harkness,' Coulson said in the same tone. Steve was oddly reminded of a teacher sorting out squabbling toddlers. But with more guns.

Harkness held up his hands. Or at least, he began to, before Romanoff pulled back the safety on the gun in a menacing fashion. 'OK, OK! Look, if it helps,' he said in a slightly strained tone, 'I don't actually remember that, which means I was drunk out of my mind –'

'Not entirely implausible,' Romanoff muttered.

'– or someone drugged me –'

'Widow,' Coulson said questioningly.

'Not guilty, Sir,' she said blandly.

'– _or_ I haven't done it yet.'

There was a beat, and then Coulson sighed and motioned for Romanoff to lower the gun, putting away his own. 'You know, it says a great deal about the nature of my job that I actually believe you.'

'You said Agent Romanoff didn't like you,' Steve said suspiciously. 'Why would you say that if you don't remember any of this?'

Harkness grinned. 'I guess that hasn't happened yet either.'

The flight to Germany took a while. Steve sat in the back of the jet, turning the shield over in his hands idly.

'You know,' he said to Harkness, who was sitting across from him, 'There are times when I look at my life and wonder what on earth is going on. This seems to happen a lot more when you're around.'

Harkness grinned. 'It's only going to get better, kid. Wait till you meet the rest of the initiative.'

'Why, who else has Fury signed up?'

Jack grinned in a faintly worrying fashion. 'They aren't signed up. Yet.'


End file.
